


Clutch Dump

by Fusionmix



Category: Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha | Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha
Genre: Adopted Children, Aged-Up Character(s), F/F, Family, Gen, Temporarily Unrequited Love, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-31
Updated: 2015-03-31
Packaged: 2018-03-20 12:45:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3650847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fusionmix/pseuds/Fusionmix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Subaru Nakajima cannot drive stick, and Teana takes it upon herself to enlighten her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. spoilers on minivans

**Author's Note:**

> Known less colloquially as 'dropping the clutch', the clutch dump is a maneuver by which a vehicle with standard transmission can attempt a fast start from the beginning of a race. It involves opening up the throttle with the clutch held down to achieve high RPMs, and then suddenly releasing the clutch so that it springs back without resistance while the vehicle is in gear. This forces the transmission to engage very quickly, instantly transferring power to the wheels. While on paper one of the quickest ways to take off from a complete stop, a clutch dump put extreme wear on the drive train and transmission and is not recommended. 
> 
> This is an admittedly self indulgent American AU, wherein all characters live rather mundane lives and all magical employ has been swapped out for appropriate parallel careers or activities that will allow the structure of characters' lives and behavior to mirror the series as closely as possible (ie Fate is deployed in the Navy, Nanoha left the military but re-joined her parents' martial arts academy as an instructor, Vivio and Erio and Caro are all adoptive siblings, and nobody is suddenly a barista). 
> 
> At this point in time, Teana and Subaru are 19 and 18 respectively, while Nanoha and Fate are in their late 20s.

For the second time that morning, Teana Lanster’s left knee gives out on her. Mid-kick, with her body half-twisted, it lurches under her with a dull throbbing ‘clunk’ and her chambered right leg spasms into a jerky parody of a side kick. The breath leaves her lungs in a hiss when she hits the mat.

The presence at the side is undoubtedly Instructor Nanoha Takamachi, still and patient – knowing better than the help Teana to her feet, as the drill lines all around continue their counts. Nobody stares or acknowledges her mistake. The air here, close by the ground, smells like rubber and sweaty feet.

Teana stands up, loose and fluid over the unpleasant grinding in her knee. “Sorry, Ma'am, she says, and forces a grin she hopes doesn't wobble.

The youngest Takamachi smiles back, but her eyes are stern. “You need to take it easy, Miss Lanster. You’ve been gone for a while.”

“I’ve healed up, I’m sure of it,” says Teana, hopping from one foot to the other. “You don’t need to worry. At all. Ma’am.”

“Okay,” says Instructor Takamachi, voice too light not to make Teana’s gut heavy. “Don’t force yourself. Dial back the power, and kick low. Focus on the timing and form for now, and the range and speed can come later.”

“Yes, Ma’am,” barks Teana, and turns attention back to the drill as it shifts to working the other leg.

Her right leg trembles from calf to hamstring when she puts all her weight on it, but she clenches her hips tight as her left coils to her chest; when she slowly extends it, her form does not waver. All right, she thinks, and elation churns like caffeine in her belly. On the next kick, she dares to blade her foot more sharply, and on the next with a little push reaches almost 90% of the height she once carried off so deftly.

One count kick remains in the set. If she manages her old standard, maybe Nanoha won’t notice that her left leg is going numb from the knee down after the stumble. Up comes her knee, tight to her body as her right foot pivots smartly beneath her, and, continuing to turn, gives out; the world whips sideways when she falls.

“That was my _right_ leg, says Teana, out loud, confusion winning out over pain. She tries to get up quickly, but Nanoha has already signaled somebody to replace her at the front. Teana is on her feet by the time Nanoha reaches her, but she knows it’s too late.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers. “I guess I slipped on-“

“Teana,” says Nanoha. “I think it would be best if you didn’t push yourself like this. If you continue to do so, I will have to remove your name from this class roster. You won’t heal if you abuse yourself like this. You know that.” Her voice is almost pleading on the last few words. Almost.

Teana knows, and opens her mouth to respond, but nothing comes out; the humid studio air is clammy and gross at the back of her throat where the words refuse to emerge. Nanoha pats her lightly on the back, and gestures to the side of the room, past where younger students would normally gather to ready themselves for classes later in the day. This early, the space is blank, and Teana's eyes trace the line of electrical marking it off from the floor until Nanoha motions her to move. “Let’s talk in the back.”

Dumbly, Teana lets herself be guided though the drill lines and into the office, where she belatedly remembers to snap into an attentive ‘at ease’ position. Her fingers feel cold and sticky at her back where they touch, and if she straightens them out her belt beneath them is dry and rough as sandpaper. The breeze of an oscillating fan passes over her. Usually, she’s thankful for the summer privilege to forgo a sweltering _gi_ top and practice in simply a t-shirt tucked into the pants, but now goose bumps prickle across her shoulders. Calm, she reminds herself. She has to look calm.

Nanoha’s expression is completely unreadable. Today, unusually, she is clad in the full white performance team uniform, blue highlights crinkled smartly along her sleeves as she drops into a mirror of Teana’s posture, un-phased by the fan’s droning chill. Thinking perhaps she might appear _too_ calm, Teana adjusts her stance slightly.

“You can relax,” says Nanoha. “I’m not angry at you. I admire your willingness to work hard. You know that, too. But, Teana, I don’t want to see you burn yourself out again.”

“Ma’am, I didn’t burn out,” she hears herself say, and cringes internally at how rough and strained the words sound.

“Nope,” Nanoha chuckles humorlessly. “You sure didn’t!”

Teana blinks twice, but holds her tongue and listens as Nanoha continues, “You didn’t get anywhere near the point of burnout, today. I am not going to watch that happen again.”

Rebellious moisture gathers in Teana’s eyes, and she wills it to evaporate. It doesn’t, nor does the curl of painful tension in her chest compress itself into easily-managed anger. Her next breath shakes, and Nanoha’s expression softens.

“I’m so proud of you,” she says softly. “But you need to stop punishing yourself. This injury wasn’t your fault. Trying to push yourself to overcome it like _this,_ will make it your fault, though. Please remember that, and please; go home for today.”

Nanoha leads her out of the office and to the back of the room, off the mats, where shoes and bags lie along the wall, out of the way of drills. Scrubbing a hand across her face, Teana finds that her vision is clear again.

“I’m sorry, Ma’am,” she says. It’s wooden. Her limbs feel hollow, like they’re full of cold air.

“I will see you at the regular classes, I hope, Miss Lanster?” Nanoha smiles.

“Yes, Ma’am,” Teana digs her phone from her bag along with a change of clothes. The lock screen informs her of eight new text messages, five missed calls, and two voice mails.

“Probably good to check that; it was going off all class,” says Nanoha as she slips by to take her spot at the front of the room. Teana’s face heats; she hadn’t heard it at all. Definitely better to silence it next time so nobody will be bothered, she decides.

This number of notifications is daunting; she wants to push them back in her bag and find an excuse for not answering later. Instead, she scrubs her thumb across the screen, waits for the messaging app to load, and hoists her bag over her shoulder to take leave. She can wait until she’s home to change.

There is one name appended to every single text and call.

“Subaru, what the hell?” Teana mouths, not wanting to disrupt the new series of drills. As she passes them, she doesn’t quite manage to keep herself from taking a peek. It’s a simple kickboxing power exercise. Teana scowls at a guy in the middle row who throws elbows so floppy, it’s like he _wants_ to get his wrist snapped back into his sternum. Blinking back rising frustration and the urge to correct him, she wrenches her focus away and trudges to the door while she reads the multitude of messages.

“ _Tea! I got my new car! You gotta come see it!”_

“ _Tea, Anthony dropped it off and it’s orange! He said orange is the rarest of the OEM colors!”_

All the texts are permutations of the same thing. Subaru Nakajima has finally purchased a new car, and has apparently forgotten – again – that Teana goes to a 6:00-9:00 extra class three days a week.

It’s not yet 7:00 when she shouts her ‘goodbye ma’am’ to the studio, bows, and steps out into the hazy morning. Though obscured by clouds, sunrise casts the parking lot in dull, yellow-grey light, glinting on asphalt still wet from wayward sprinklers. From somewhere down the lot, faint children’s yells mingle with the steady grind of sparse weekend morning traffic. A repetitive _click-clack_ heralds what might be a distant train’s passing.

The situation feels like the beginning of a sad, introspective novel, thinks Teana. Her future is in doubt, some useless turd who can’t throw a good elbow has more right to be in Master Takamachi’s class than she, and the Stars competition team will _never_ have a place for her again. She wants to go home and sleep.

She should probably call Subaru back first, though. Hopefully, she’s too enamored with whatever vehicle she’s acquired to pick up her phone, and Teana can say she _tried_ and go home and….

Subaru doesn’t pick up, but that clacking sound has built to a steady whir and Teana can hear the tinny strains of a ring tone.

“Oh my god,” she says, turning around, because there’s Subaru gliding towards her across the pavement, roller blades clacking at every division.

Subaru spins herself around deftly, and slowly drifts alongside Teana backwards, so they face each other once she passes. “Tea! Did I interrupt class?”

Briefly, Teana scans the lot for an orange car. “Uh. No. Were you going to join?” Not like Subaru needs to be in a supplementary class for strength. The skater drops into an impressively deep front stance, continuing to roll as she clenches up her body to maintain posture, which gives Teana an excellent view of her many, many abs thanks to Subaru's persistent belief in the viability of crop tops as a fashion choice.

“Nope!” Subaru answers, and double punches ahead to slow her backwards momentum and narrow her stance, until she’s upright and can push forward. “I came to see you!”

Teana lets her bag slump to the sidewalk. “You roller-bladed _all the way here_?” She can’t believe this. The Nakajima's house is almost ten miles away. “When did you get up?”

“At like five, when Anthony brought the car.” Subaru bends her knees low and manages a sharp hook around Teana, just close enough to snag her duffel bag and hop off the curb out of reach. Teana considers yelling at her, but her heart isn’t in it, and as she quietly sets off to her car, Subaru falls in beside her.

“Is Tea ok?” she says, after a moment, in that hesitant third-person way she does when she’s afraid Teana will get angry at her for asking.

Pushing down guilt, Teana reaches out gently to reclaim her bag. “Nanoha said not to come to this class for a while,” she admits. In words, it feels damning.

“Well,” Subaru says, slowly, gliding on one foot theatrically with her hands clasped together, “Does that mean you aren’t busy right now?”

They’ve reached Teana’s sedan, and she sighs. “Subaru, where’s your car.”

“Iiiin my driveway.”

“And why didn’t you bring it here if you wanted to show me so badly?”

“Becaaaaaause,” says Subaru, and blades a slow loop around the car.

After some fumbling in the bag for her keys, Teana yanks open the back door and tosses her bag on the seats. She waits for Subaru to clatter past before she slams it shut. It thuds closed louder and angrier-sounding than she’d intended, but she goes with it, snapping, “Because why?”

“Because I can’t drive it,” says Subaru meekly, and looks everywhere that isn’t Teana.

Teana freezes with her hand on the driver side handle. “What.”

“It’s a manual, and I don’t know how to drive it,” Subaru blurts, and Teana realizes, again, that her words came out much more harshly than she intended. “I couldn’t tell Anthony that!”

Teana parses though potential reactions. The first one – the easy one – is annoyance, followed by mocking incredulity. She takes a breath, lets it out, and focuses on Subaru’s innocent, beseeching face. A laugh bubbles up in her throat, and the relief in Subaru’s face prods at her guilt again. She ignores it, because she does not need to think of all the times she has been an asshole when she is so determined not to be one right now, and presses on.

“Are you serious? Oh my god,” she says, again, but smiles. “You’re such a goof.”

Subaru leans across the roof of the car and sighs. “I know, it was really silly. But that’s why I wanted to see you. So you can teach me how. Also,” she took a deep breath and pushed herself back, “Anthony left it in the driveway and Nove has work in an hour so I need to move it before then.”

“OK,” says Teana evenly. “I think I can manage this. Let me give you a lift, and we can….” Subaru swoops into the seat before Teana even has her door fully open, unstrapping her roller blades as she goes.

“You smell like dirty pennies,” Teana wrinkles her nose and changes the subject, glancing sidelong at her passenger once they’re situated and she has the parking break disengaged. She’s reminded that her car is overdue for a wash by the new patches of body-contoured grey grime on Subaru’s white top, accrued from her flop onto the roof.

Subaru stretches; Teana realizes where she’s looking and hastily focuses on fitting key to ignition. “You’re going to shower before we do _anything_. And I still need to change.”

She stops herself from thinking melodramatically about how she wasn’t in class long enough to build up a sweat. Nanoha is completely justified in sending her home early, and Subaru will be a welcome distraction from her angst.

“Mm, OK,” says Subaru as she stares intensely at the stick shift, where Teana has habitually draped her hand. “How does this work?”

It _does_ look cool, Teana thinks, and slowly adjusts her lazy half-grip to look even more practiced and nonchalant. “I’ll get to all that later. Let’s just go get you de-stunk first.”

“Tea is so _rude_ today, says Subaru, but both of them wear smiles.

Teana makes a show of stomping in both clutch and brake before she turns the key. “First thing, at least,” she says firmly, “is that, in a manual, you want to have your clutch _and_ brake in before you start.”

 

* * *

 

The drive to Subaru’s house doesn’t take long, but every red light is full of questions, most of which Teana fields with “later,” and, “we’ll do it with _your_ car.”

She realizes she never asked what Subaru had bought. With luck, it would be something practical. Anthony Kameda was a good guy, a big pre-00's Nissan/Datsun fan, and she trusts he would not have saddled Subaru with an old Fairlady Z or something of that ilk. The transmission would be beautiful to for teaching someone, but Subaru doesn't have the technical know-how to keep it running. Then again, that would give Teana something to do. Not, of course, that Subaru should automatically come to _her_ , but….

Once the latest light turns green, she vents the curiosity as a question. “So, what did you get?”

“It’s a secret.” Subaru makes a smug face. “You’ll see.”

“Well, considering this is your street,” Teana says drily, as she winds the wheel around the gentle suburban corners, “it won’t be a secret very much longer.”

She downshifts early to make a point when the Nakajima house, and Subaru’s new vehicle, come into view. The engine whirs noisily, a substitute for Teana’s temporary loss of words, as they glide to a spot at the curb.

“Oh my _god_ ,” she says, for the third time this morning.

There’s a sturdy, compact, bug-eyed Impreza WRX in the driveway, pale orange and faded, with dimples of what can only be hail damage speckled across its hood like acne scars.

“Isn’t it great?” Subaru cries, already halfway out of Teana’s car before the engine is off. “It’s _so_ great.”

“Uh,” says Teana, and clicks the parking brake pedal into place. “Did you seriously buy a Subaru.”

Subaru cackles. Teana is not sure of an appropriate reaction, and settles on, “That’s terrible. You’re terrible.”

“No, I’m awesome. Look at my awesome car.” Subaru does a little dance around it, hands high like she has successfully invoked the commanding spirit of flat-four engines and caused it to imbue her chariot with irrefutable divine majesty.

Teana drags herself and her bag out of her vehicle while Subaru is occupied by this ritual, reconsiders the rising sun, and retrieves a pair of sunglasses from the glove box before she shuts the door.

“I _am_ looking,” she grumbles, once she follows Subaru onto the driveway. “And it’s at _least_ twelve years old and has a turbo. Do you _know_ what’ll happen to your insurance?”

She worries that she has been too harsh again – she’s actually excited about this – but Subaru is not cowed at all, firing back, “It’s all wheel drive and very maneuverable! At least it’s not some…” she looks significantly at Teana’s innocuous silver sedan, “Some eco-friendly, economist, defanged FF platform!”

For a second of pure indignation, Teana gathers her thoughts to _destroy_ this unenlightened elitist she calls a friend, but catches herself. Something about the way Subaru said it was _off_ _–_ Subaru’s fields of technical gifting do not extend to pretentious vehicular terminology.

Teana has absolutely no choice but to call her on it. “You don’t know what that even _means_. Who told you that? There’s _nothing_ defanged about a V6 Altima. I had one before the commercials tried to make them cool.”

Subaru stammers for a second, visibly taken aback. “I. Uh. Two wheel drive?”

Teana smirks in a way she hopes is appropriately omniscient and condescending. “Have you been talking shit about cars with Erio? Again?”

“Um.”

Her Altima’s dignity assured, she goes in for the kill. “Erio thinks Camaros are well-designed despite their piss-poor visibility. His taste is below mundane, approaching plebian. He likes underglow. He is saving to buy a Mustang. Don’t listen to anything he tells you. He’s not even old enough to have a license yet.”

Subaru picks leaves out of the windshield wipers.

“Erio Mondial,” declares Teana with a deprecating sweep of her arm, “has not had a haircut in two years, plays only DPS classes in video games, and helped you install a _spoiler_ on your family’s _minivan_. Go inside, take a shower, and _then_ we shall see what crap Anthony’s foisted on you.”

Subaru scowls theatrically. “You have to come in and change too, you know.”

“I still can’t forget that spoiler,” Teana says as she follows Subaru inside. “I can’t believe you dad let you keep it on there.”

“You’re so _mean_ ,” whispers Subaru reproachfully, a reminder that most of her household is still asleep. “I love our Odyssey! It’s objectively the best mom van.”

“Defanged FF platform,” says Teana in a hissed sing-song.

“I don’t know what that even _means_ , remember,” retorts Subaru in a stage whisper that is more of a stage scream, retreating upstairs.

“Take a shower! Get de-stunk!”

Subaru sticks her tongue out, and vanishes around the bend of the stairs.

“You are an adult,” Teana grumbles after her softly, not anticipating any more comebacks.

Before she can decide on a place to change clothes, Subaru juts her head out around the corner and drawls, “Tea is welcome to join meee,” with a grin that does not completely disarm her tone or over-the-top leer.

Teana turns on her heel and makes for the nearest unoccupied downstairs restroom, managing to sputter, “We need to get the damn car out of the driveway before your sister’s work, right?”

She doesn’t know what to do with Subaru when she’s like that, and annoyance, as always, comes easiest.

 

* * *

 

In and out of the shower in less than seven minutes, Subaru is downstairs and armed with running shoes before Teana has time to wait on her. She stuffs her feet into the sneakers while roughly finger-combing her shaggy hair back long enough to secure with a bandanna. “Ready to go?”

Teana winds her cast-off brown belt around palm and triceps like it’s a length of cable, and stows it neatly in her bag. Subaru’s bangs are doing something uneven and stupid-looking, but she distracts herself from fixing them by double-checking that the unused _gi_ top in her bag is still neatly folded without wrinkles.

The t-shirt worn under her uniform, however, poses a problem. “Can I have a plastic bag? I didn’t realize this got so sweaty.”

Subaru nods and ducks out of the room to retrieve one, handing it over with a low, “I _said_ you should have joined me.”

Teana jams her balled up shirt into the Wal-Mart bag with enough force to punch her middle finger’s second knuckle through the plastic. Wordlessly she tosses it into her duffel, wrenches the zipper closed, and flings the straps over her shoulder. “…let’s go.”

Subaru scampers to the door and whips it open with a flourish. “You’re the boss.”

Squinting at the sudden onslaught of sunlight, Teana flicks open the bars of her sunglasses and slips them on with that she hopes comes across as an ironically cool nod. “Damn straight,” she grunts, mentally appending a snide _unlike you_ before they’re outside and she can get a good, long, blessedly distracting look at Subaru’s new Subaru.

 

* * *

 

The WRX’s back end looks to have suffered the ravages of an ever-so-slightly off-color spray can, probably to disguise a scrape or dent, but Teana declines to point it out. Subaru could very well tie anything she has to say into more Comments, possibly about Subaru’s own back end, which has not suffered anything beyond that which is bestowed by years of squats, roller blading, and rigorous martial training. Teana would have no legitimate complaints, and honesty is not something she feels very keen on with regards to these things.

She is unsure as to what ‘these things’ are, only that right now she doesn’t want to think about them, and thank god Subaru is talking again.

“I know it’s kinda beat up, but it’s only cosmetic and it meant Anthony could get it super cheap,” says Subaru, lightly tossing the keys in her hand. Teana blinks out of her death glare at the pale orange car’s rear end.

“Gonna give me those?” Teana nods towards the keys, sidling up to the drivers’ side of the vehicle. Confusion passes over Subaru’s face for a moment, and she ducks down to peer through the window for a second before she laughs.

“Oh man, I forgot it’s on the other side; I’m so used to driving our old van.” Instead of tossing the keys, Subaru leans awkwardly across the roof to hand them to her, leaving a clean streak on the dirty car that now matches the one on the Altima. It puts a smile on Teana’s face before she realizes it.

“You excited too?” Subaru asks, almost shyly, and Teana strains through a few seconds of uneasy regret that her earlier teasing had convinced Subaru she didn’t actually want to be here.

She pushes her smile into a full-blown grin, an earnest one, and pops the door locks. “Definitely. Let’s go!”

With a whoop of glee, Subaru pumps her fist in the air once, and slams her head on the doorframe as she swoops in, hard enough to shake the entire vehicle. Teana lunges into her own seat, sputtering, “Holy crap, are you...?”

Subaru wears a silly grin and scrambles with her seat belt before gingerly pulling her door closed. “So, where do we start?” She asks, bouncing a little bit, with not even a wince to indicate her mishap.

Grasping beneath her chair for the adjustment levers, Teana turns up a trio of desiccated tater tots and gingerly deposits them into the nearest cup holder. “Has Anthony ever cleaned this?”

“He told me it has new gas, oil, and runs fine. But,” and Subaru leans over with an expression of deep concentration to inspect her own seating area, “nothing about – oh man, french fries. Eww.”

It smells like must, dust, and the ghost of drive-throughs past. “Oh my god,” says Teana, for a fourth or fifth time today; she’s lost count. “We’re cranking up the A/C. We are gonna blow all this stink out of here.”

She puts the clutch on the floor and turns the key. The WRX gnashes its teeth once and shakes to rumbling life beneath them.

When the fan kicks on, it hums normally for only a brief moment before it sputters like a weed whacker hitting pavement and coughs out a spray of finely-minced, mostly decomposed leaf particles. Teana shuts her eyes, and Subaru reflexively throws her left arm up in a block but screams a little, which ruins the effect.

Teana heaves a sigh. “Don’t worry about it, my brother's – my old truck used to do this,” she says, and thumbs the fan off, wondering if she should worry about how pleased she is that Subaru is completely confused and dependent on her for an explanation. “It just means it’s been parked a while. A shop-vac will get the debris out of there.”

Subaru nods once and extracts a soggy leaf from where it protrudes between the slats of the nearest vent. “For now, let’s just roll the windows down.”

As she takes this suggestion and the power windows grind away at their task, Teana remembers that truck – how the vents blew leaves, how the clogged A/C condensation pan would pour icy water onto the passenger’s feet during sharp left turns, how the electronic locks misbehaved in the cold, how the windows screamed when rolled down and wouldn’t go back up unless their individual switches got pressed – “Sounds good,” she says, yanking her mind away from memories.

The bite on the clutch is easy to catch when she pumps it a few times, to get a feel for it. “Oh, this will be easy to learn on,” she exclaims with as much confidence as she can, to mask her relief. It’s not a lie; everything feels smooth if a little more robust than her Altima.

Letting the clutch spring out hard, she notes that it squeaks a little, but not enough to indicate a serious problem. “All right,” she says, dropping a hand on Subaru’s seat beside her shoulder. “Let’s go find a field.”

“Not a parking lot?” Subaru glances at her hand and back to her face, bouncing in the seat ever so slightly. More of a vibration, really. “I learned in a parking lot.”

Adjusting the rearview mirror, Teana cocks an eyebrow at herself. These shades _are_ too big. Good thing Subaru won’t point it out, given that she’s unashamedly wearing a paisley-print white bandanna. Oh, right, there's a question to answer.

“This isn’t a minivan,” she says at length, and _clunk-clunk_ s into first gear.

“Not a defanged FF platform?” Subaru’s eyes are hooded slyly, but there’s an expectant note in her voice.

“Heyyy, you’re learning!” Teana catches the bite a little late on engaging and grimaces at the lurch when she feeds extra gas, to prevent a stall, but Subaru is too enthralled by her car entering motion to say anything.

 

* * *

 

Behind the Costco is a section of partially-completed freeway, behind which is a mountain of eroded earth overgrown with weeds. And behind that, is a bit of badly-paved road which winds of to the back of another parking lot connected to what used to be an Albertson's.

“This is where teenagers go to bang,” says Teana without thinking and restrains herself from a fearful look at Subaru, braced for the innuendo she’s probably walked herself right into. When silence is her answer, she dares a sideways peek and smiles, because Subaru has both hands on the dash as she leans forward, eyes shining, with no indication of having heard. The muscles in her forearms flicker every time they go over a bump, and Teana re-focuses on the road as it gives way into the confused residue of poor city planning and budget cuts.

“The suspension is a little loose,” she mumbles. Who knows what the previous owners put it through? “Might need new bushings on the front end.”

Subaru looks around at the varied terrain and nods approvingly. “This looks awesome. Those teenagers sure know…”

Teana stops babying the engine, and grits her teeth through turbo lag as the revs climb into range and a sharp pop-hiss-whistle throws them back in their seats.

“Good buy!” She bellows, unnecessarily, as Subaru has her head out the window screaming the praises of Anthony Kameda, god of second-or-third-hand motor vehicle distribution.

Though Teana knows she probably shouldn’t throw the Impreza so violently across the lumpy landscape, but the healthy stutter-snarl of its engine takes her back to an old truck bucking under her hands and feet, wind yodeling around the boxy mirrors while her brother calmly murmurs instructions beside her. Always so calm, even when her inexperience threatened to roll the vehicle over. _I wouldn’t do that again_ , he would say. _Maybe gentler next time._

_Yep, you found the brakes._

_That’s what it feels like to lose traction._

_That’s the sound of grinding gears, warning you._

Teana feels her lip curl as she guns the motor hard on approach to a rise and the WRX is temporarily freed from the bonds of gravity. Amidst her elation comes a bang that claps her teeth together, mouth filling with sharp iron tang as her cheek opens up between jarred molars. “Shit.”

She slams in the clutch and guides them to a gentle stop on the clay-rich yellow-brown earth.

“Did you ruin it?” Subaru’s face is contorted in what Teana is sure must be miserable betrayal.

“That…was the undercarriage,” says Teana, matter-of-fact, proud that her voice stays level just as his would have.

It works. Subaru is reassured. “Should I go look? Let’s switch. After I go look. I’m gonna go look.”

“Ok,” says Teana, keeping her face impassive even though she might have just screwed up her student’s new baby in a fit of needing to prove something to somebody whom she knew, knew, _knew_ she would never need to prove anything; she knows that is not how Subaru Nakajima's brain functions. The passenger door opens, closes, and Subaru drops out of sight. A scrape shakes the car, and she reappears halfway around the front of the car bearing a wizened tree branch.

“It was a stick! It’s ok!” With a short yell, she violently snaps it over her bare knee in one swift, clean motion. “Take _that_ you, uh, _purveyor_ of _LIES_.”

Teana smiles and leans an arm out her window, dangling the keys. “Switch?”

“Gimme, gimme, gimme,” Subaru says, making grabby hands until Teana drops the keys into her palm and withdraws to open the door.

“Oh my god, let me get out first,” complains Teana, not meaning it at all, taking care her voice doesn’t hold any real irritation. “And don’t make any unnecessary comments about sitting on my lap. I can’t teach you that way and in the case of emergency the airbag would slam your spine into my face and probably kill me.”

“Ok,” Subaru grins as Teana babbles past her. She plops into the seat and looks up again with a completely blank, innocent expression. “Where’s the adjustment thingy. You have shorter legs.”

“With the tater tots,” Teana says drily as she circles around to the passenger side, and slides in with a grunt. “It’s getting bright. Want my sunglasses?”

“Gimme gimme,” Grabby hands again, and Subaru pokes herself in the temple trying to put them on. “I’m as cool as Tea now.”

“I’m not cool,” blurts Teana, cursing her obviously tense body language. There’s no stick to rest her hand on, no distracting engine at hand to rev in lieu of response.

Subaru lightly drapes her hand over the shifter, and Teana wonders how closely Subaru had been watching her. Larger and more callused that her own, faded purplish-white scars across the biggest knuckles speaking of perfect striking form, its position is nonetheless an uncanny mirror of her own grip, of her brother’s. After a moment of hesitation, Subaru palms into first, too fast and rough.

“Start in neutral,” Teana’s voice climbs out of her chest, even as a confused _something_ fights to well up in her. “No, gentler. It’s two motions. Clunk,” she mimes pushing the stick to the side, “and _thunk_. Two. Don’t force it.”

Subaru’s next attempt starts with an awkward try-hard slap, but Teana does not voice her opinion of how silly it looks. “Ok. Now, back to neutral, then clutch in to start.”

“Brake too, right, Tea?” Subaru looks at her expectantly.

She remembered. Teana smiles. “You got it.”

With a short sputter – the ignition is still in pretty good shape – the Impreza trembles to life and grumbles flatly beneath them, and Subaru’s hand hovers uncertainly over the shifter until she startles into recollection with, “Oh, first gear. Shifting to first!”

Teana nods. “Slowly let out the clutch until – “

Subaru immediately springs off the pedal like it has spontaneously caught fire, and the car bucks once, and dies. “Shit! Shit, I’m sorry.”

“That was the clutch, yep,” Teana hears herself say, in this new voice that isn’t connected to the ball of permanent frustration coiled up in her head, that she doesn’t have to think about. “Back to neutral, start again.”

Like before, with the branch under the car, Subaru’s expression is calm again. Clutch in, brake in, and the ignition groans wretchedly. All of Subaru’s limbs abandon post simultaneously, pedals squeaking as they spring back, and she turns to Teana, aghast. “What did I do this time?”

“Clutch needs to go in more. It wasn’t down all the way. You don’t actually need the brake in to start; it’s just a safety precaution.” Teana can tell Subaru focuses too much on the brake, and hopes this sets her priorities straight.

Slowly, Subaru’s hands and feet return to their roosts like frightened birds back to power lines. The engine rumbles to life, and Teana can see in the tension of her calves that this time she’s sorted out the pressure on the pedals. Overall, she’s too stiff, but the voice which only comes out calmly doesn’t mention this; instead, Teana motions for her to start again. “When you feel a sort of catch, and the car starts to sound and feel a little – lower pitched? Rougher? – start to give it a little gas as you keep pulling off the clutch.”

Subaru nods grimly and finds the bite quickly. “Do I take my foot off the brake?” she yelps, jerking her head around to stare at Teana. The protesting engine rumbles, and stalls. “Oops.”

“Yeah. If the clutch is out while the brake goes in, you’ll stall the engine. Go again. You’re not hurting it. Starting is the hardest part. Once you’re moving, it’s easy.”

This time, Subaru lunges for the gas as soon as the clutch starts to grip, and, after a half-second of angry whirring,the gears engage with a mighty wrenching _thump_ and hurl the car forward. Subaru yelps and reflexively stomps the brake. They stall with a heave. Kicked-up dust seeps through the open windows and Teana squints against the sunlight. It’s going to be a hot day.

After almost a minute, she crosses her right ankle over her knee and looks at Subaru.

“Too much gas and then too much brake,” says Subaru, firmly. Teana’s aviator shades aren’t too big on her; they look good. Almost makes her look like she knows what she’s doing, Teana thinks wryly, and then nods.

“And come off the clutch steadily. Not all at once. You can’t rush it.” She says nothing about how Subaru’s inadvertent almost-clutch-dump could crack the transmission case. The part of her not caught up in giving calm instruction scratches at her subconscious with an almost-revelation.

She has no time to further cogitate on dawning epiphanies, as Subaru, jaw set in concentration, starts up the car. Slowly, she lets out the clutch, until Teana wants to say something to remind her about gas when the engine throbs sluggishly, but then Subaru’s other foot is off the brake, on the accelerator as her left rises smoothly from the clutch and they rumble forward.

“All right!” Teana says. “That’s much faster than when I first learned,” she adds without thinking, because Subaru has always picked things up so _fast_ and –

“Yeah, but you had to learn to drive at the same time! Tiida taught you from the start and I already know how…” Subaru quickly looks to Teana, with an almost-wince in recognition of what she must believe to be a grave error worthy of triggering Teana’s temper.

Teana chews at the gash in her cheek, but it doesn’t re-open. “Tiida was a good teacher and I was a really bad student,” she says, at length, because her brother is so many good memories and she supposes shouldn’t make mention of him into a bad one for Subaru. “But yeah, I guess already knowing how to drive helps a lot.”

“Can I try shifting up now?” Subaru asks, as they slowly snake between pits that once held puddles.

“Sure,” says Teana, pride in her student flattening whatever ugly, misdirected jealousy threatens to emerge. “Clutch in, gas off –“ the engine flares at them “- gas off _first_. There we go. Then down, two clunks, to second. Then clutch out fast and give it gas. Good!”

They jerk, but don’t stall, and bounce gleefully through a patch of long grass. Dozens of roused grasshoppers ping off of the hood, or clatter on the windshield, and several of them spiral in through the open windows.

“Close them! Close the windows!” Teana shouts, laughing in a scramble for her window button as Subaru half screams, half roars defiantly and powers through the rest of the grass. Hoppers seethe around their feet and arms and hurl themselves against the windows even as they slide shut.

“Don’t get bug juice on my upholstery! _Third gear_!” Subaru hollers, too loudly in the closed car, as Teana tries to bludgeon the invaders with a flip-flop. She executes the shift with confidence, even if it still is a little too early on the gas.

“That’s the dirt pile up ahead,” Teana notes, batting a bug away from her face as they career towards it.

Subaru takes no note of her, or the grasshopper crawling into her own cleavage.

“I don’t think we have enough clearance to make it up,” says Teana’s Calm Voice even as her jaw clenches up. She’s dimly aware of her window opening and Subaru’s left arm returning to the wheel from the switch, before Subaru cranks the wheel hand over hand and they wrench sideways. Centripetal force cannons most of the hoppers past Teana’s face and out the waiting window as they make a sharp, sliding turn and power out of it in a raged skitter of worn tires over shriveled weeds and grit.

“Damn,” says Teana, voice shaking with adrenaline, when Subaru decides to slow down and hits the brakes too hard. In third, the car easily stalls. “That was awesome,” she adds, before Subaru has a chance to say anything self-deprecating about the mistake.

“Best team!” Subaru shouts, and turns to go in for a hive five. Unprepared, Teana misses partially and covers by clumsily clasping the incoming hand, which Subaru turns into a midair arm wrestling match. Teana’s shoulder twists back in a twinge of sudden discomfort as Subaru violently tries to pin her arm on the center console and elbows the horn in the process. They both jump at the sound, let go, and everything about Subaru’s sudden transition from triumphant to startled is too much. In the middle of an ugly, overgrown half-lot, in a goofy little sedan that smells like sky and earth and Subaru’s dumb sporty-fresh man shampoo, Teana busts up laughing so hard she can’t take a breath.

With Subaru beaming at her, and the whole day ahead, she can only stop when Subaru nearly clutch-dumps, again, and even as she gives a Very Serious Warning, stray chuckles spill out of her mouth.

“So,” says Subaru, finally straight-faced again. “If I have the throttle open and then suddenly let the clutch out, it will do something bad to the, uh, transmission case. The T-case. Damage the car.”

“Yeah, that’s called dropping the clutch, or a clutch dump. Don’t force the start. Just let out the pedal, and give it a little gas when it starts to bite.” Teana starts to hear her own words echoed curiously in Nanoha’s voice, and nearly chokes on the end of her sentence.

“Oh my god,” she says, elated at figuring out the nagging earlier revelation.

“What now?” Subaru fiddles with the low scoop of her t-shirt, frowning as she scratches an itch.

“I’m trying to clutch dump my life,” says Teana, and puts a forearm over her eyes. It doesn’t really need to be said, and Subaru has no real context for it, but she wants to say it out loud, just to make it real.

“Don’t do that?” Subaru offers, and makes a face that indicates she does not appreciate or understand Teana’s accidental Deep Life Metaphor.

Face hot, Teana waves a hand dismissively and bends over to hide her muddled tangle of embarrassment and epiphany, as well as inspect the floor for remaining grasshoppers. She sits back up once the blood rushes to her head and opens the door a crack to flick a recovered hopper outside.

“Any more on your side?” She begins, question still-birthed as Subaru has her shirt halfway off and is on an expedition to bra country.

“I think there’s one in my clothes,” she whines, before Teana lunges over to grab her wrists.

“I saw one crawl in earlier, now stop disrobing before somebody drives by and sees!” She hisses. “Look, it’s right…shit, trying to jump away, got it…right here.”

Teana yanks Subaru’s t-shirt back down, drops back heavily into her own seat, and sends the bug to join its compatriot.

“Who’s going to see?” Subaru snorts. “I thought that banging teens only go out at night.”

Teana shuts the door on her flip-flop. “There’s a first time for everything,” she grunts, and then mentally _kicks_ herself because that only opens up more awful opportunities for Subaru. She can probably field Subaru’s inevitable first comment with something about how ‘teens’ only applies to people who are underage, which they aren’t, but _why_ does she keep thinking about this and that would only make it _worse_ in every way and hopefully there’s another grasshopper to curtail this disaster before it leaves the gate.

“I want to show my new car to Erio,” declares Subaru, derailing Teana’s expectations. “It’s after 8, he should be awake.”

Teana grasps at the subject change like it’s an oxygen mask, stammering. “Isn’t he supposed to have soccer practice at like, 7?”

Subaru gets the car started without a hitch, and lurches them towards the orphaned highway feeder. “Let’s stop and get food first. I want pancakes.”

Mental cabin pressure back to normal, Teana looks out the window and nods her assent. “Sure, but I need to watch my calorie intake. Do _not_ let me order carbs.”

 

* * *

 

Teana somehow ends up with hash browns. “How did this happen. You let this happen. _I_ let this happen.”

Subaru swallows a mouthful of bacon after approximately three chomps and says sagely, “It was the french fries in the car. Subliminal messaging.”

“Gotta be it.” Teana snaps her fingers. “Damn those tater tots.”

“Bless those tater tots,” says Subaru, and steals a forkful of hash browns.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have not written fic in half a decade. This was fun.
> 
> UST, domesticity, and Erio Mondial, Aged 15 And Boisterous, after the jump.
> 
> [EDITED 1/24/16]


	2. in which basically everyone needs to take a shower

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vivio is a Navy brat. Erio and Caro play an MMO. Rainbows continue to be straighter than Subaru, while Teana shrouds her emotions in terrible life-changing metaphors about cars.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Teana's brother Tiida (named after what we Americans know as the Versa) drove a Nissan D21-series Hardbody Truck, which can do all of the things mentioned. I initially considered having him drive a Mitsubishi Lancer for name pun reasons, but decided against it. 
> 
> Subaru receives her 2002 Impreza WRX because I am very sure that her and Teana's last names are references to the long-running rivalry between the Impreza and Lancer as rally competition vehicles. Tsuzuki wanted in on that tense car company rivalmance, I'm sure.
> 
> The minivan Subaru drove in the past was her family's right hand drive RA9 Honda Odyssey, brought with them when they moved to the States. It is more compact than the North American version, and is all-wheel drive enabled.

With exception of a single stall at a light and a harrowing, noisy accidental shift to second instead of fourth gear coming off the highway, Subaru maneuvers her new-old car through traffic without a hitch.

“This is _so_ much cooler to drive than my old car,” exclaims Subaru, and checks back over her shoulder for a second, before she turns back with a gleeful expression. “And it already has a spoiler on it!”

“You’ll have to break the bad news to Erio,” says Teana drily, scanning the house as they pull up. “Good, Nanoha’s not back from the class yet.”

“Hmm, how can you tell?” Subaru is only half paying attention and Teana smiles a little at her efforts to park as close to the curb as possible. “Her car might just be in the garage.”

Teana points at the strewn mess in front of the garage door as they disembark and approach. “Because Erio left his bike and all his soccer stuff out here, and she would have made him put it away.”

Subaru nods thoughtfully, and skips up the walk to the door, delivering two sharp knocks. “So observant,” she says. “Huh, maybe he’s on the computer with headphones and can’t hear us?”

The door wrenches open so quickly, Teana’s hair flutters in the mini-vacuum it creates. “Is that your new car?” Erio demands, eyes passing over them to lock on the Impreza.

“Yup,” says Subaru, leaning on the door frame while Teana wonders when Nanoha found the time to braid Erio’s hair. Even with strands flying away from soccer practice, it looks much sharper than his usual messy, uneven low ponytail.

Erio fidgets in the doorway, looking pained for a bit before he moves over to let them in. “I have to finish the instance Caro and I started when she got online this morning, but don’t go anywhere because you need to show me as _soon_ as we’re done.”

He wheels off to fly down the entryway and pound his way up the stairs. His room, if Teana recalls correctly, overlooks the street; he must have seen them drive up.

“Are you guys doing a dungeon?” Subaru calls after him, making for the stairs and kicking off her shoes as she goes. “Can I see? Which one? I’m still super unfamiliar with like, all of them!” Her stream of questions fades into muffled noise after a door slams shut upstairs.

Teana drifts in less enthusiastically, pausing to pick up the fallen sneakers and set them side by side with sandals and chucks and some scuffed steel-toe combat boots. Hopefully their arrival did not wake anybody, but the only other person who could be around at this hour would be Nanoha’s daughter Vivio, and _she_ would be more likely to be at a friend’s house this time of year.

Something about the shoes strikes her as _off_ , but fiddling with their arrangement is a waste of time, so Teana wills the feeling away and pads into the kitchen barefoot, where she almost runs into Vivio, startling the girl so badly that the egg she holds almost ends up on the ceiling.

“Teana!” she squeaks, and turns quickly to set the egg down safely on the counter. “Oh! I’m sorry I didn’t come to the door; I had raw egg hands and then I thought you went upstairs with them, but they were so loud I was going to warn them to be quiet.”

Teana leans against the edge of the kitchen island. “In a bit, I’ll go up. I was teaching Subaru to drive her new car this morning.”

“You’re not at Mama’s class?” Vivio adjusts the stove dial, centers her pan, and goes after the egg again.

“Mm. Not today.” Teana wonders how long Erio would be stuck in-game. It would be better if they could just pick him up and let Subaru take him for a ride. Inwardly, she curses the morning’s returning frustrations and anxiety. The dial on the stove is set too low, she’s sure, but commenting would be unnecessary. Her foot taps jerkily, without rhythm, against the tile.

Vivio cracks the egg deftly and scowls when it doesn’t sizzle, which sends a flicker of irritation through Teana, for which she immediately feels sick at herself. Summer break drags at her such that she cannot find words to describe it. She wants sophomore year to start up, to go back to university and inter herself in lectures and jogging trails and weight racks.

Upstairs, Erio and Subaru shout about something, and a thud shakes the house, followed by near-hysterical laughter. Teana catches something about spiders.

As Vivio flicks her gaze up with a worried wince of concern, Teana connects the dots between the odd need for quiet and the combat boots, and startles when the downstairs bedroom door clicks open.

“Mommm,” yells Vivio, jumping away from the stove to hold her hands up like a ward. “Go back to bed! That is an _order_!”

“’m off duty,” rasps Petty Officer 1st Class Fate Takamachi-Harlaown, bedraggled and swathed partially in a blanket. “And I was already up to make sure Erio woke up in time for practice, earlier.”

Vivio crosses her arms. “Tell him to go shower. He got on the computer with Caro and smells like butts.”

Fate swivels, slowly, in the general direction of the stairs. “Erio,” she croaks. “Go shower.”

All upstairs sounds ceases before exploding into footsteps. “ _FATE_ _!_ ” howls Erio as his door bangs open and he flies to the bannister, before hurtling down and around the stairs two at a time.

“Fate!” shrieks Subaru, a second later, and clatters after him.

“Teana?” says Fate, bemused, suddenly noticing the other person in the kitchen where Vivio has dashed her hands in the cold faucet and made a beeline for the impending group hug.

Blinking stupidly, Teana notes that Erio has grown taller than Fate over the course of her last deployment. It puts a lump in her throat for reasons she can’t articulate.

With kids gathered around her – well, kids and Subaru – Fate fights a blanket-draped arm out of the tangle like a sleepy, beckoning wing. “Come here, you,” she says, and Teana finds herself tractor-beamed into a hug.

“Eww, you _do_ need to shower,” says Subaru, to Erio.

“Everyone here needs to shower,” retorts Teana, without thinking, again.

“Hey!” Vivio protests.

At the same time, Subaru pulls out of the hug to grab her around the waist and shout at the ceiling, “Everyone except _meeeeee!_ ”

Teana extricates herself as well, mumbling an apology to Fate about how dusty _and_ sweaty she probably is at this point. “I wasn’t in class long so I didn’t _think_ I got very sweaty, but then I showed Subaru how to drive her new car and dust got in while the windows were down – “

“And bugs,” adds Subaru.

“I’ll get Caro on FaceTime,” says Erio eagerly, and Teana feels dumb for derailing things to be about her.

Fate nods, smiling sleepily, and stumbles theatrically towards the kitchen. “Coffee,” she mumbles.

Teana stands awkwardly as people disperse around her. Fate being back for a while is a big deal, she can’t intrude on something like this; she’ll just be in the way or say something bitchy or selfish – or worse, be there when Nanoha gets back and have to face her after being such an idiot in class.

This isn’t even about interrupting a family reunion morning, she thinks with disgust. It’s about her being a coward who doesn’t want to face her mistakes, even after that stupid metaphor about clutch-dumping with regard to her life. Aren’t those sorts of revelations supposed to change one’s attitude and approach to life? She cracks a crooked smile at her own silliness. All this does it make her feel stupid and self-aware now that she recognizes her behavior.

“Are you ok?” Erio asks, from the kitchen, which reminds Teana that she’s staring weirdly at a wall.

“Sorry, just tired,” she replies on autopilot, blinking back to the now. “Did. Uh, did you still want to see the car?”

“Yeah!” Erio nods vigorously, even as he fiddles with his phone. “Here, say hi to Caro! She’s still at camp.”

“Hi?” Teana says, as the girl waves at her from the screen Erio briefly shoves in her face. It’s gone in a second, Erio complaining about the wi-fi connection, and there’s no way they’ll be out before Nanoha is back, and _oh god that’s the garage door._

Fate emphatically sets down the carafe and sets off for the utility room door, blanket dragging behind her. It snags on the washing machine and is abandoned, then trampled as Fate returns, carrying Nanoha. “Look what I found,” she says, as though she’s picked up an expected postal delivery from the porch.

“Hello,” says Nanoha cheerily, and waves to Teana and Subaru. “How are you girls doing?”

“Tea taught me to drive stick!” Subaru exclaims.

“Good to hear you still had a busy morning,” says Nanoha, sounding genuinely pleased. There’s not a trace of judgment or mockery, and Teana lets out a breath along with her baseless fear.

“Erio,” says Nanoha, in almost the same tone, “Please put away your things, and – oh, hello, Caro! – go take a shower. Vivio, you look like you need a hug.”

Erio slinks away along the wall with his phone as Vivio tenses. “Mama….”

Fate takes a step forward. Nanoha grins and Vivio pre-emptively holds her nose. “Mama, you’re sweaty and stinky.”

With a thoughtful expression, Fate gives Nanoha’s _gi_ -clad arm, hooked over her shoulder, an experimental sniff. “You smell fine,” she murmurs.

“See?” says Nanoha, smugly. “Fate says I smell fine. Hug time!”

Fate charges, Vivio screams, and Teana barely gets out of the way in time as their pursuit careens out of the kitchen, down the hall, and out of sight. “Uh,” she says.

“They’re so cute,” Subaru groans, palms clasped to her face. “They’re _so cute_.”

Vivio’s wailing laughter drifts in from another room, “Now _everybody_ needs a shower,” followed by Nanoha’s best diabolical cackle.

“Well,” says Teana, to nobody, and gives a shaky ‘heh’.

“Well,” Subaru echoes, turning to her. “Now it’s time to pick up Tea?”

Teana’s pretty sure her heart stops, and her voice gives out into a whispered squeak as Subaru unceremoniously crouches and scoops her up at the knees. She briefly grabs at a fistful of t-shirt and shoulder to keep from keeling over backwards as Subaru straightens with a barely perceptible grunt and sets her on the counter, fingers sliding up the backs of her thighs to guard where the squared edge would dig in as Teana’s legs dangle.

“There,” Subaru says, unreadable.

“I’m too tall now, you fucking idiot,” is the first thing Teana can hiss out. Too tall for what, she wonders at herself, why did she say that, but she knows immediately what she thought of and everything devolves into a half-panicked haze.

“OK,” says Subaru, doesn’t look at her, and bends to gently butt her head into Teana’s stomach. Subaru’s heartbeat is heavy through her ribcage where it brushes Teana’s knee, and Teana says words that she can’t hear over the blood thundering in her ears.

She doesn’t know what she said, but Subaru disengages all at once to let her slide jerkily off the counter; the egg in the pan is definitely sizzling now, noisy enough to hold all her thoughts and attention as she walks to the stove and turns it back down. There’s a phantom pulse, against her knee, and she kicks at it suddenly and violently with her heel. Vivio’s questioning gaze as she returns to the kitchen with Fate feels damning.

“Today is weird,” says Teana.

The garage door grinds away in the background as Erio, back from putting his bike away, trudges in from the utility room with the discarded blanket, which he tosses over Fate in passing.

“Wanna go see the car now?” Subaru pipes up. “Before you shower?”

“Sure!” Erio rolls his eyes at Fate’s raised eyebrow. “I’m not _that_ bad, Fate. Let’s go.”

As Subaru passes by, so careful not to brush up against any part of her, Teana wants to clap a hand to her shoulder and tell her she isn’t angry, but her arm doesn’t move and now it’s too late and Fate has turned the raised eyebrow upon her.

“Weird morning,” says Teana, and rubs her sore knee, which is even sorer now. She declines breakfast when it’s offered, and sits off to the side while Fate and Vivio chat, the latter occasionally complaining about how she can _definitely_ heart Mama singing in the shower or Erio being pubescent and obnoxious outside.

“Subaru is probably the one being noisy and pubescent,” Teana grumbles, winces at how genuinely irritated it comes out.

“Some things don’t change, I guess,” says Fate mildly, and a not uncomfortable silence stretches between them, punctuated by her and Vivio’s eating.

Teana decides not to think further regarding what about Subaru has or hasn’t changed, and rests her cheek on a fist. “I didn’t know you were coming back.”

Fate yawns and tries to take a sip out of an empty coffee cup. “Mhm. Supposed to be yesterday afternoon, but a flight delay meant I wasn’t in until late. I was so glad to be back, I didn’t realize how exhausted I am until I tried to get up this morning. Sorry for being such a terrible host.”

“No, not at all!” Teana sits up. “Sorry to intrude! We came to show Erio the new car because, you know, he kept asking about it and wanting to know if Subaru would get a Mustang, ugh – “

“The GT is a good vehicle,” Fate comments into her still-raised mug. “A lot of power.”

Teana reddens, why would she bitch about cars to a woman who knows so much more about them? “Sorry. But, yeah. I was an idiot and got kicked out of class and that’s what I spent the morning doing instead.”

Eyebrow again as the mug lowers. “Kicked out?”

Teana puts her face on the table and explains.

“Trying to drop the clutch on your life,” Fate muses. “That’s a new one. At least you realize it, so you can adjust your behavior.”

Teana just nods, while Vivio says, “Adjusting is hard. I miss being little and dumb so I didn’t have to, but I know it will work out in the end.”

“Well, I wish I’d reached such a place of enlightenment when _I_ was thirteen.” Teana pushes back from the table, and stands to stretch. “I think I’ll go see what they’re up to,” she says, forcing a smile that almost immediately grows genuine and warm in spite of her uncomfortable mood. “Thanks for letting me – us – invade. You should all come by some time soon, Hayate and the rest will go crazy to know you’re back.”

Fate lets go of her mug to let Vivio take it along with the rest of the dishes. “Definitely. I forgot you were staying with them over the summer. Nanoha probably told me over Skype, but, you know. Stuff.” She waves a vague hand in the air, which is the most nonchalant way Teana has ever seen ‘fighting an endless pseudo-war overseas’ described.

“Oh yeah,” says Teana, like she has any idea. “Tell Nanoha I said bye; I’ll see her in class on Monday.”

“I’ll relay that,” Fate smiles, and waves. Vivio offers one too as she loads the dishwasher, and Teana manages to return it before she slips out of the kitchen to the entryway and freedom.

 

* * *

 

Subaru is ready to go by the time Teana is outside. Erio declares that he prefers naturally aspirated vehicles with larger engine displacement, but turbos sure do sound cool, before he goes in for his long overdue shower. Then it’s just Subaru next to the Impreza, not looking at Teana. She pops the locks and moves to get in.

“Any problems?” Teana asks once they’re inside and she can focus intently on buckling herself in.

“Nope,” says Subaru. She clinks the key into the ignition, but doesn’t turn it. Once, twice, she pumps the clutch, like she’s listening to the minute squeak it makes. Teana wonders if she hadn’t noticed it before. Subaru takes a breath, and her tone is distant when she says, “Well, there is something.”

Teana’s chest clenches up. Stiltedly, she nods, and turns a casual glance over like she doesn’t already know Subaru probably isn’t about to talk about the car.

“So like, you know when I was starting up,” she begins, subdued. “And I gave it gas too early, and all of that.”

Teana nods again, the motion clunky, and takes her next breath quickly so it won’t shudder.

Subaru stares fixedly on her hands on the wheel. “Well. Like. Sometimes, I guess because…well, whatever reason, sometimes it’s hard to hold the clutch down that whole time. And I know you said it’s fine even if I push the gas pedal in too early, as long as the clutch is down, but I guess I like having the throttle open and it’s revving and revving and I get excited, and my leg gets tired and just lets go of the clutch because, I guess, I forget for a minute. And then everything is in gear so suddenly and I don’t know where to go from there, and I know I shouldn’t have had the gas, the gas down so _early_ , but it was a mistake and-”

If Teana is not careful to shunt her stupid clutch dump metaphor out of her mind, it all starts to sound like more than one conversation, layered up and potentially terrifying.

“It’s OK,” says Teana, voice firmer than she’d hoped, almost fierce. She’s surprised by her own sincerity. “The T-case is fine. You probably gave it a good shock, but it’s fine. I’m not mad at you. It's hard to get right.”

“I’m so glad,” says Subaru, dull and shaky, like she's scared to be relieved. “I was afraid to really go anywhere, so I just went 'round the block and told Erio about the grasshoppers.” She offers an unsteady, hopeful smile.

Teana leans back and sighs something out, long and full, and doesn’t berate herself for the tremble in it. “Go ahead and start up. It should be fine as long as you don’t get ahead of yourself and do sudden weird things.”

She wonders if they are still having two conversations, and stares hard out the window into cloudless blue sky, not quite able to look at Subaru right now, just in case they are. “Now come on, I left the Altima at your place.”

Subaru turns the key, and Teana can hear the slap of a palm as the car shifts to first. She feels the car’s vibrations stutter, then stabilize as Subaru gently presses the accelerator, and only the slightest lurch as they start to roll. It’s not even worth mentioning, so Teana just leans on the window and smiles against the glass as they pull away from the curb.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 'clutch dump' confirmed for Least Sexy Metaphor.
> 
> Erio and Caro are playing Guild Wars 2, by the way. If you step on spider eggs in Twilight Arbor, you are a hilarious fool. Erio also plays FFXIV - as a Dragoon. 
> 
> I spent too long waffling over Fate's rank. It is liable to change in the future, as it is difficult to come up with an actual equivalent for Enforcers when their Japanese name translates to 'commissioned officer' but their duties are more like those of an enlisted Special Warfare Operator, a Navy SEAL, in space. I like the Hard Work And Guts implications of enlisted rank, but commissioned would be more accurate. 
> 
> Nanoha wore full karategi to class for Reasons (the reasons were hickeys)
> 
> Everything is Devin's fault.
> 
> [EDITED 1/24/16]


End file.
